~$150, ~$110 for Ubuntu Linux version with 1GB of RAM and 8GB of storage

Our appreciation of mini desktop PCs is well-documented at this point. In the age of the smartphone and the two-pound laptop, the desktop PC is perhaps the least exciting of computing devices, but there are still plenty of hulking desktop towers out there, and many of them can be replaced by something you can hold in the palm of your hand.

Intel’s new Compute Stick, available for about $150 with Windows 8.1 and $110 with Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, takes the mini desktop concept about as far as it can go. The Stick isn’t even really a “desktop” in the traditional sense, since it’s an HDMI dongle that hangs off the back of your monitor instead of sitting on your desk.

It’s not very powerful, but the Compute Stick is one of the smallest Windows desktops you can buy right now. Let's take a quick look at what it’s capable of.

Hardware and software

The Compute Stick is a boxy plastic slab, matte on the bottom and glossy on the top. It’s a utilitarian design—there’s a small slot for a security loop, vents on the top and sides to help with overheating, and the bare minimum of ports and buttons. It looks like it was made to be hid behind monitors and TV sets, which is fitting.

A tiny fan inside the stick spins up when it's been busy for a while, even if what it’s been busy with isn’t an activity you’d consider strenuous (installing a large application like 3DMark, performing a routine background anti-malware scan). The noise is a barely audible but insistent high-pitched whirr. It’s sort of like a buzzing light bulb: you’ll either be able to get used to it or it will slowly bore a tiny hole through your skull. Thankfully, it’s usually not on while the system is idle.

Inside the box, you’ll find the Compute Stick itself and a small HDMI extension cable you can use if the Stick won’t fit neatly into your HDMI port. A micro USB power adapter is included for TVs or monitors that don’t have a USB port or can’t provide enough power through one (like the NUC’s adapter, it includes several different types of prongs for different countries’ outlets).

All of our observations and benchmarks are based on the way the system behaves when plugged into that adapter, but your mileage may vary a bit. For instance, when we plugged the stick into one of the standard USB 3.0 ports in the back of an iMac, it was enough to turn the system on but not enough to let the Compute Stick recognize and power a USB keyboard. There may be other performance and power consumption differences, too.

The Compute Stick hooked up to a bunch of cables. It's capable of being less conspicuous than this once you hook it up to wireless peripherals.

Andrew Cunningham

On the left, a full-size USB 2.0 port for peripherals, a micro USB port for power, and the power button.

Andrew Cunningham

On the right, the microSD card slot, which can accept cards up to 128GB in size.

Andrew Cunningham

The Compute Stick is narrower and thicker than an iPhone 5, but this gives you an idea of roughly how small the Stick is.

Andrew Cunningham

It comes with an HDMI extension cord you can use if there's not room to plug it directly into the port.

Andrew Cunningham

A USB power adapter and cable (not pictured) are also included.

Andrew Cunningham

The Windows version of the stick includes a 32-bit version of Windows 8.1 with Bing—the only difference between it and standard Windows 8.1 is that OEMs exchange the ability to choose Internet Explorer’s default search engine for a discount on the license (users can still change the search engine and browser to whatever they want). 32-bit Windows helps to relieve the memory pressure you’ll feel with just 2GB of RAM, and while it does reduce your general system performance in some cases, the applications that truly need the performance and memory increases that 64-bit Windows provides aren’t the kinds of applications you’ll want to run on the Compute Stick. Most Windows applications (some of our benchmark apps aside) run just fine in 32-bit mode; many don’t have a 64-bit mode in the first place.

The Stick’s BIOS is barebones and includes just a handful of options: you can update the BIOS, pick a boot target, toggle Secure Boot and the EFI shell on and off, and specify whether the system is running 32-bit Windows or Ubuntu Linux.

The biggest potential downside to the Compute Stick for people who just want to buy it and play with it is that it has those operating system limitations—it has a 64-bit CPU, but 64-bit Windows won’t install. Windows 7 won’t install either because it won’t see eMMC drives or boot from them. We imagine the various flavors of Ubuntu will install and run just fine, but Ubuntu itself is the only one that’s officially supported. Just about anything that will run on an x86 processor will run on a NUC or any other desktop, but the Stick is more limited.

Finally, the biggest functional problem we ran into was with the Bluetooth adapter. When the system was busy—lots of storage or CPU activity—mouse and keyboard input would become extremely laggy. Intel tells us that new drivers are coming that should help fix this issue, but the Stick only has one USB port. Bluetooth connectivity is especially important for keyboards and nice and other peripherals. It’s important that it works well, and as of this writing it doesn’t.

Andrew Cunningham
Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue. Twitter@AndrewWrites